The frackers have put a ceiling on the price OPEC can get away with

When it published the results of its Q2 survey of energy executives, the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas included a comment from one oil and gas exec that defines the overall effect of the shale boom on global oil prices:

“The exploration and production industry needs to get used to the paradigm that oil prices will be set for the next several years by the breakeven prices needed to drill Permian basin shale wells because there is a lot of tiger in this tank!”

It’s a telling comment. For one thing it confirms that U.S. oil right now is all about the Permian basin—with highly productive multiple stacked layers of hydrocarbons, and wells not all that deep or overly expensive to drill, it’s more economic to drill and produce the Permian than almost any other oil play....

There is much more.

One of OPEC's biggest mistakes since its founding was to try to drive the frackers out of business through predatory pricing of oil The frackers responded by becoming more efficient and in many cases can now produce oil at a lower price than most OPEC countries. By lowering their cost of production they have made it almost impossible for OPEC to manipulate prices upward.

One of OPEC's biggest problem is its quasi-socialist economic model where the state uses oil revenue to keep its population satisfied with authoritarian rule. It is a model that does not lend itself to increased efficiency.

"It continues. Have seen gunships firing and heard much activity in the last few hours."...
The Iraqi claim is plausible. It is just the kind of thing that could be expected from ISIS forces. ISIS is in a desperate fight and appears willing to pull down all those around them as they lose.

Some injuries were reported and more than a dozen people were arrested after opposing sides clashed at dueling pro- and anti-Trump rallies, Berkeley, Calif., police said.
The liberals engage in projection by calling Trump supporters fascists, when it is in fact, their supporters who are sparking the violence in Califonia. There is a strain of intolerance for other points of view that is enforced by people dressed in black and their faces covered. They physically attack Trump supporters or other conservatives. These people may wear black but the are the Brownshirts of liberal fascism.

Fuel Fix:
OPEC producers took another 153,000 barrels a day off the market in March as part of its bid to drain the world’s oil glut.

In the cartel’s monthly report released Wednesday, independent sources reported the group of oil-producing countries has cut output by 1.1 million barrels a day since December.

Last month, Libya’s output dropped by nearly 9 percent, and production edged lower in the United Arab Emirates, Venezuela, Nigeria, Iran, Angola and other countries. Saudi Arabia raised production by 41,000 barrels a day.

That effort has pushed oil prices above $50 a barrel in recent months, breathing life into U.S. oil patches like the Permian Basin. U.S. crude rose 16 cents on Wednesday to $53.56 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, as traders reacted to media reports that Saudi Arabia, the cartel’s de facto leader, wants to see OPEC continue production cuts into the second half of this year.

But even as the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries works to slow…